Idaho Grandpa

I learned something today. Several things, as a matter of fact.
   First I learned that public libraries are thriving and vital and relevant even in today's insane economic times. Good to know since I spent my college work study in the library. Or libary, if you wanted to drive my boss nuts.
   Second, I learned that the information age, with all its time wasting and Facebook and Twitter and self-important bloggers like me, actually produced some things of value. For instance, you can search past census records online. And that's actually pretty cool.
   Third, I learned that my grandfather - my father's father - was born in Idaho. This was, evidently, not news to my mother but I had always assumed he was born in Kansas. I also learned that his stepmother was born in Russia, and yet her native language was German. More than likely she lied to the census man about where she was born, since we were looking at the 1920 census, two years after the end of the Great War. Germans weren't real popular in America at that time.
   While I'm glad to know more about my family history, this only leads to more questions. Like what about my grandfather's biological mother, who evidently died or was out of the picture in 1920, when he was five. Where was she from? Who were her people?
   As cool as finding out more about my family history is, I am much more impressed with the fact that the census records are online. That's a lot - a LOT - of manual data entry. And there's no real value to it, at least from an MBA point of view. If you had taken the proposition to Wharton that someone start a business that involved data entry from reading 70+ year-old census entries, you'd probably be laughed out of the school.
   But there's much more than monetary value to this. In the space of five minutes I went from 'knowing' wrong information about my grandfather's childhood to having irrefutable proof of where he was born and where he was living in 1920. Can I take that knowledge and make any profit from it? Of course not. Would any self-respecting business person have funded census data entry as a private enterprise? Of course not. But does knowing the truth enrich my existence? I can tell you it does, almost immeasurably.
   Think about the library itself. They're non-profit government entities. No money to be made there at all. But even on a Saturday morning, I saw all sorts of people coming in to use the facility. I was tremendously impressed with the number and kind of community services that library makes available, and I know it's not unique. More than ever I see libaries becoming social centers for the community, despite the fact that there's not a single dime to be made from doing so.
   So screw you, MBA holders, for all your 'immediate monetization.' There are things in life that matter way more than filthy lucre. Like family and social connectedness. And libraries. Especially libaries.
   I have hope again. And all it took was twenty minutes in my local library. That's a great investment, don't you think?